


The Unknown

by CaptainTarthister



Series: The Affair [2]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Cheating, Declarations Of Love, Explicit Language, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-26
Updated: 2016-06-27
Packaged: 2018-07-18 07:39:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7305649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainTarthister/pseuds/CaptainTarthister
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tortured by her betrayal and feelings for another man, Brienne struggles to get away from her husband, Oberyn Martell.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. One

Not even a shower could lift Brienne from the wretchedness of the previous night. She scrubbed the soap hard on her skin until it was red and stinging and she had to bite her lip as the water fell and felt like a thousand tiny blades stabbing her all at once. 

She got dressed in the guest bedroom. Over the last few weeks, she had started putting her clothes there, sneaking in only a few pieces so Oberyn wouldn’t notice her dwindling wardrobe in the closet they shared. Not that he had. Her motions were quick and efficient as she put on clothes, rolling the sleeves of her hyacinth-blue wrap dress down to her wrists. The make-up masked the paleness of her face but the mascara couldn’t rescue her sapphire eyes from their dull, dead stare. 

Brienne made her way to the kitchen, where habit rather than want drove her to make coffee and cook breakfast for her husband. Turkey bacon. Egg white omelet in a non-stick pan tossed with tomatoes. She was finishing setting the table when Oberyn’s spicy scent hit her nostrils, followed by his arms wrapping around her waist. 

“How’s my baby?” Oberyn murmured between her shoulder blades, the highest point he could reach as she was in heels. Her knuckles were white from gripping the plate as his hands trailed from her waist down to her hips. She let out a breath and calmly retracted his hands from her body. 

“You should eat,” she told him over his shoulder as she put the plate down and went to get coffee. 

Noticing the lone place setting as he sat down, Oberyn asked, “You’re not joining me?”

This time, Brienne turned around to face him. Dressed in a pale blue shirt she got him for his birthday last year and a striped tie, Oberyn looked like a man who had everything right in the world. He was showered and happy, his dark eyes twinkling as he gave her a small smile before digging into his breakfast. 

How many days have looked like this—he the husband off to work, smiling at the wife for preparing him a delicious breakfast. Brienne wondered in how many homes, how many lives. It had been written so many times, for so long, that they were born knowing this. The husband would get up and put a kiss on her cheek. Her response was a smile, a wish that he had a good day. 

And it would be the easiest thing, to slip back into this familiarity. She could look at last night as a game, when she pretended her husband did not know her anymore, that he hurt her because she asked, asked that he play. The script was carved in her mind and her body, she only had to listen. Walk over to Oberyn, kiss him on the lips as she used to and let him take her on the table. Last night was a game. In a few steps, everything would be back as they were and if she worked really hard, it would be real and Jaime and the last seven months was a dream, a heady fantasy. 

It was all so easy. She knew this.

Which was why she said, “No.”

“Really? I think this is the best you’ve made,” Oberyn told her, putting another forkful in his mouth. “Have a bite, come on.”

She looked at her shoes then at him. “Oberyn, I’m leaving.”

“You mentioned about having an early day tomorrow.” He grinned and she looked away, ice settling in her chest at the memory. “Well, I did not keep you up late. I am sorry, though, that you weren’t in bed when I woke up. I miss seeing you tired from fucking.” 

She remembered. Wrung out and sleepy but smiling still as he loomed over her, teasing how his strong wife barely survived his riding between her legs. How she’d take him in her cunt and in her mouth with renewed hunger, wanting nothing and nobody else. Their sheets smelled of their fucking and sweat until it was thick in the room. It used to get her drunk with lust for her husband. Last night she shoved a finger down her throat and threw his taste and kisses down the toilet. Shoved a soap between her legs and swallowed the unholy sting that flared as she scrubbed and scrubbed until her skin was raw and she felt clean and untouched again. 

“I’m no—I’m not coming back.” The words felt foreign in her mouth in spite of speaking it in the only language she knew. She swallowed and said more firmly. “I won’t be coming back.” 

“Oh?” Oberyn patted a napkin on his lips. “The museum is sending you on a trip again?”

“No.” She turned her blue eyes on him. “I’m not coming back here.”

Her words hung between them. Oberyn frowned and tossed the napkin on the table.

“You’ll have to elaborate, Brienne.”

“I want a divorce.”

He laughed. “That’s funny.”

Her cheeks scarlet she stammered, “N-No.”

It was her whispered reply that reached into him. Oberyn’s laughter quickly died and he looked at her. Slowly, he got to his feet.

“Why would you want a divorce?” He asked softly. The hairs at the back of Brienne’s nape stood. “You push me away for months, you wouldn’t let me in for months and now you’re leaving me?”

“Where were you?” Brienne demanded, angry that he would pin the divorce on her. She stomped toward him, not needing the shield of the table or anything in between them anymore now that she’d said what had been burning in her for so long. “Where were you when my Dad got sick and died, where were you when I just needed you for no other reason, I just needed you?”

Oberyn gestured sharply at their surroundings. “Giving you this life!”

“I needed _you!_ ”

“I’m here now and you’re leaving?”

“Until when? Two days, three weeks? I need a deadline so I’ll know when you’ll undo everything again.”

His eyes were hard as he bit out, “Do not do this, Brienne.”

“It’s done.”

_“No.”_

“I’m fucking someone.”

He shook his head. “I don’t believe you.”

“I’ve been fucking him in our bed since your last trip. You didn’t smell him? I didn’t change the sheets.” Brienne’s mouth curled into an ugly curve as her chin trembled. “You tasted him in my mouth. I was still wet with him when you fucked me.” 

“You lie.”

“To you for the last seven months. Yes. Not now.” Brienne said. “I want a divorce, Oberyn.” 

“You think I’ll let you leave this marriage just because you’re fucking someone else? Oh, Brienne. You have so little faith in me.”

Brienne delivered the killing blow. “I don’t want you. _I don’t love you anymore._ ”

But Oberyn’s weapon was better and he knew how to use it.

“Too bad. Because I still love you. You’re all I want.”


	2. Two

With Brienne still silent after being outmaneuvered, Oberyn began to slip on his suit jacket. His calm expression betrayed nothing, his easy, brisk movements showing as if nothing important had just happened. He got his plate and walked to the sink to rinse it before putting it in the dishwasher underneath. Brienne continued to stare off into space.

“I love you.” He told her firmly.

That snapped her out of her reverie. Brienne jerked as if he’d struck her before turning to him.

“It doesn’t matter,” was her reply.

“I have every right to shout and beat you for fucking another man,” Oberyn’s voice shook at the word fucking. “I should hurt you for betraying me but I’m not. I love you. You can do every abominable thing there is and I will still love you and take you back.”  
“You don’t care about me. Didn’t you hear? I want out of this marriage.” Brienne said. “Even if I hadn’t cheated I would still leave.” Her eyes were dangerously watery. “You betrayed me too.”

“I should have been there for you. I know that.”

“Do you? I called. I begged.”

“If I’d returned just in time, would you be standing here now hurting me like this?”

Brienne stepped back when Oberyn reached for her.

“We’ve been unraveling for a long time, Oberyn. There is no way this could have been stopped.”

Her quiet tone was unnerving. This time, Oberyn snapped.

“The gods damn you. How can you be so. . .calm about this? Why aren’t you fighting like I am?”

“I have nothing to fight for. I don’t want to fight for us. I’m tired. I can’t. Please.” She begged him. “I could have just left. Disappeared. But I’m telling you because I—I—“

“Fuck you if you think you’re doing me favors with your honesty.”

Brienne hung her head. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

For the second time, Oberyn reached for her. Again, she managed to avoid him. She shook her head.

“Please don’t.”

“Just because you’ve fucked another man, let me fuck you while still wet from another man, doesn’t mean I don’t want you. I love you,” Oberyn said desperately. “You have to believe that. I’ve been a terrible husband to you but know that I never meant to hurt. Brienne,” he begged. “Please. Don’t turn me away. Don’t leave me.”

“It’s done. I don’t love you. I can’t anymore. I don’t want to be with you.”

“What do you want from me? There has to be something.”

“Let me go.”

“No!” He suddenly shouted, making Brienne jump. 

Brienne headed for the door. “I’m not coming back.”

“You’re not taking your things?”

“I want nothing from this marriage. Only my freedom. Let me go, Oberyn.”

“No,” he growled.

“I won’t fight you for what’s mine. I don’t have anything from this marriage.”

Now that hurt. “Fuck you, Brienne. You have me!”

“Not for a long time.” She shook her head. “Not for a long time.”

As she reached for her purse, he said, “Don’t you walk out that door.”

“I’m sorry. I really am.”

“Fuck you.”

 

“You should have called me,” Margaery Tyrell gently admonished her. “Brienne, you didn’t have to do that alone. At least call me for back-up, have me wait for you outside the house.”

Brienne shook her head and looked helplessly at the untouched cup of tea in her hands. “No. Thank you, but I had to it by myself.”

“Still.”

She squeezed her hand. “Thank you.”

Margaery squeezed back. “I only answered your call and opened the door. That doesn’t amount to thanks, sweetie.” She pressed a kiss on her knuckles then asked, “How did it go?”

“Horrible.” Brienne sagged on the couch. “Gods. The one good thing from it is I’ve been able to call in sick at work. Being in the gallery would have driven me crazy replaying this morning in my mind on and on.”

“Does Jaime know?” 

“Haven’t told him. He’ll fly in tonight.”

“Don’t look so tragic,” Margaery teased her. “Now it’s out. You don’t have to hide.”

Brienne had to admit there was some freedom in telling Oberyn the truth. It was out and there was no going back. Still, Oberyn’s refusal, his telling her he loved her had been unnerving. I love you, I love you, he had told her several times. Would she have backed down if this happened a year ago—the death of their marriage, Jaime? The answer was still no. And the reason, the only reason, was Jaime Lannister.

“I’m scared.” She told Margaery. “Now there’s no reason for us to hide. What if it was the thrill that kept us together?”

“Do you think Jaime’s with you because of that? Brienne, he told you he loves you.”

“Yeah, but. . .”

“But nothing. You love this man, Brienne. He was there for you in all the times Oberyn wasn’t. He cares for you. The circumstances of your meeting aren’t ideal, true, but if you get each other in the end, what does it matter?” 

Brienne, suddenly pink, giggled. “You are such a romantic, Margaery Tyrell.”

“Well, that’s how I make my living.” Margaery said proudly. “Right. Now.” She stood up and put a soft, light blue afghan blanket next to her. “I have to write another story about a devastatingly handsome man and sweetly beautiful woman living happily ever after. You are going to rest, sleep, do whatever to recover from a very emotional morning.” She kissed Brienne on the forehead. “You were brave, Brienne. The hard part’s over.”


	3. Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A reunion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We go from zero to a hundred miles an hour in this chapter. It's not pretty.

Jaime went straight to Margaery’s place from his day trip, to Brienne’s surprise. He stood at the door, looking a little rumpled and travel-worn though still handsome with a playful gleam in his emerald eyes and his slim lips quirked in an amused, mocking smirk. As Brienne blinked owlishly at him, Margaery announced in a singsong voice that she was going out with her boyfriend and wouldn’t be home until morning. Her knowing wink at the couple sent Brienne blushing and Jaime chuckling under his breath. They listened to her take the elevator.

“Come here, you,” Jaime told her and Brienne went to his arms. Their heights matched closely so they could easily rest their chin on each other’s shoulder as they hugged. She clung to him, inhaling the scent of bad, instant coffee and soft scent from his skin. Then they were kissing, his backpack dropping to the floor as she pulled him into the apartment with her mouth and arms. She sighed against his mouth, kissing him with a thirst as if she’d long been denied nourishment. In a way, she was.

He tugged at the loose neckline of her sweater to rake his teeth across her hard shoulder. Her hands climbed to his hair, sinking in the golden threads. They looked at each other, both of them flushed and panting. He was hard against her thigh.

“This can wait,” he told her, kissing her and pulling away reluctantly. 

She nodded. “I understand. You’re tired from being cooped up in your car."

His laugh was a rich, joyous sound. “Not at all, wench. We just don’t have to rush. I intend to savour you.”

She rolled her eyes at his annoying nickname for her and he laughed again, pressing his forehead against hers. “My name is Brienne, not wench.”

“You’re sure? You greeted me like one just a minute ago.” He kissed her quickly on the lips and she took his hand to bring him to the couch. 

“Marge doesn’t cook and I just can’t right now. We can have pizza delivered. Or Chinese.”

“Hey, whatever you want.” Jaime said, sitting back heavily with a sigh. “I can call?”

“No, I’ll do it. You rest.”

“Actually, what I want is a shower. Do you think Margaery will mind?”

“I’m sure she’ll be fine with you using her orange mandarin shower gel,” she teased him as she started dialing the pizza place. “But hands off the loofah.”

He grinned. “I never did like a rough touch.”

While Jaime got cleaned up, Brienne finished giving instructions for their pizza. She also threw in an order of chocolate chip cookies and soda. 

Jaime got out of the shower, looking like a god with a pink towel slung low on his hips (“Right. Jaime, that Marge would mind. Best that you just replace it.”), droplets of water still on his skin and his damp hair dark gold. He smelled like fresh summer fruit. He shot her a smile as he got clothes from his suitcase and got dressed in front her, making sure to take his time putting on his t-shirt and twirling his boxers suggestively at her before he put them on. He was all brisk and business pulling on his jogging pants, however, but when he sat on the couch and called her with a crook of his finger, he was playful once again. The Jaime that lit her up from the inside.

Anyone looking into the apartment would think they have been together for a long time. Brienne slipped into his embrace as if he’d always held her, and he looked at her with a shine in his eyes as if he knew her very well, inside-out. She couldn’t remember when she and Oberyn had been just like this, holding each other just because. 

Thinking of Oberyn was a blot to the bliss she and Jaime had returned to as if he hadn’t been gone at all. With it came the memory of last night.

But she didn’t want to leave Jaime’s arms. Her heart thudded fast and painfully in her chest as she contemplated with how to tell him about it. She played distractedly with a loosened thread on the collar of his shirt as he watched her.

“Your heart is racing so fast I can feel it,” he whispered.

Brienne, clutching at his collar, blurted out, “I told him.”

She looked at him.

Jaime held her tighter. “How did it go?”

“Not well.”

She shook his hands away and he gave her a puzzled, confused look. Brienne moved to the other end of the couch and stared at him.  
“We fucked, Jaime.”

“Yes, we did, last night—“

“No.” She shook her head, closing her eyes then opening them. “ _We_ fucked.”

Her meaning clear, he took a deep breath. “Did you want to?”

Her lower lips trembled and she gasped, “No. Never. I’ve not wanted him that way for a long time.”

“Did he force you?”

“He won’t stop. And then. . .and then. . .” She couldn’t say it. The orgasm Oberyn forced on her with his mouth on her cunt. The defeat in her body. 

Jaime quickly understood, judging from the hardness in his eyes. “You told him no and he didn’t stop.”

“I didn’t fight back enough.”

“I know you did.”

“No. And I deserve it.”

“Fucking hell, Brienne, don’t you ever say that” Jaime suddenly roared, looking angry and horrified at once. As she continued to hang her head, he grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her. “Listen. _Listen._ No one deserves to be hurt like that. Yes, you made a mistake—“

“A mistake. I cheated on my husband—“

“A mistake. It doesn’t mean you have to be punished, least of all by yourself!”

“I came.” She whispered. “When he—when he--- _oh, gods._ “

She suddenly pushed him away and ran to the bathroom. Jaime sat on the couch, head buried in his hands as he listened to her retch and groan. He cursed ex-husbands and Dornishmen, cursed men who employed mind games with sickening ease under his breath before he got off the couch and knocked on the door. He stared at it, confused as to whether to kick it open to channel the anger he felt or to kick it open to get to his woman and make her stop. Gods, her sobs tore at his soul. 

“I’m coming in, Brienne.”

“No. No, Jaime, it smells—“

But the door opened anyway. Brienne stared at him tearfully from where she was still huddled on the floor. His grim face was a knife slowly going inside her and twisting even more slowly, drawing out her pain. 

“Jaime, I’m so sorry!” She cried out. “I’m sorry!”

Still just looking at her, he knelt in front of her. 

“Brienne—“

“I should have told him last night. I shouldn’t have waited until this morning—“

He shook his head and pulled her to his arms. She gasped and pushed him away.

“No. Jaime. Please. I can’t—you shouldn’t. You must hate me—“

He glared at her.

“When will you believe that I love you, wench?”

“I betrayed you,” she said, sounding tired and weak. She sank back on the floor, hugging her knees. “I love you and I betrayed you.”

“You did not,” he bit out. “Do you hear me? You did not.” He sat down beside her and cupped her red face, looked into sapphire pools shining with what appeared to be all the tears in the world. “I love you, Brienne. I love you. I love you. “

She nodded. 

“You did not betray me. He forced you.”

He started to kiss her but she cried out, pointing frantically at the toilet. He still kissed her but on the forehead, the cheek, the throat, her shoulder, her breasts through her shirt. Brienne gasped for his kisses soothed the marks Oberyn had left deep in her body. “Jaime,” she whimpered, her arms going around his shoulders. He kissed her on the cheek again, his arms hard around her waist.

 _“I love you so much, Jaime.”_ Her nails dug in his shoulders.

How could something that she knew was right hurt so much?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In writing this chapter, I debated whether for Brienne to tell Jaime what happened last night or just tell him she and Oberyn were over and reveal the other bit later. Lying and betrayal are two things that her character in ASOIAF/GoT appear incapable of, and only by really dire circumstances would she commit them. So in this fanfic, I thought she would lie to Oberyn until she coughs up the courage to tell him the truth while with Jaime, she's always been honest. 
> 
> Story-wise, I also didn't see the point of her holding off telling him about the non-consensual sex. Jaime being Jaime would think she was protecting him (which he surely wouldn't want) or lying to him this time (which Brienne wouldn't want at all).
> 
> I also wanted to explore the constrast of Jaime and Oberyn's reactions to Brienne's admission. Oberyn was creepy as fuck slowly revealing his cracks while Jaime is basically a battering ram once he absorbs it. 
> 
> I hope you liked this chapter. Stay tuned for Part Three. Cheers!


End file.
